Don't delay
Page 24
If you've noticed an error in this article please click here to report it so we can fix it.
• Any delay in the collection of charts will cause problems. Drivers are required to keep with them their tachograph charts for the whole of the current week and the last driving day of the previous week; they are allowed to retain them for up to 21 days. Because of this 21-day limit, an operator's failure to discover drivers offences during these three weeks does not prove that his system of supervision is so inadequate as to render him guilty of permitting its drivers' breaches.
The law itself is to blame for this three-week delay, and the court must be satisfied that an operator knew breaches were likely before it can convict him of permitting them.
The situation gets even more complicated when drivers are travelling to take over a vehicle. The time spent travelling to take over a truck, unless at the driver's home or his employer's operating centre, is classed as "other work" and must to be recorded as such. Even if the operator told the driver when and how to travel, or if the driver drives a tachograph-exempt vehicle to the takeover point, this still counts as other work.
If an HGV is driven home, it must be recorded on the tacho. However, the court decided that if he had driven his own vehicle home, it doesn't count as work.